It’s a beautiful day outside, bright new green leaves popping out on the trees, shiny clear blue sky… I’m so happy to be at this point in time- POST-exams, with what looks like good weather awaiting me outside for the rest of the day.

Exams, over. Time marched on and drew us all through the two 3-hour sessions on Monday and Tuesday afternoons… I felt deja vu, the memory of exams past- the ridiculousness of studying for long periods, amassing so much informationin your head, and then only having to put a fraction of that information down in writing. Those scant little words of the questions dictate what you do use- I stared at the Documentary module questions, mentally speaking to the examiners- you’re sure you don’t want any of my knowledge on surreal documentary? You mean I spent hours reading and writing notes on that for nothing?- but such are exams. A couple of hours, the desperate attempt to be coherent and concise, to write a superb essay in one continuous shot. And that sticky feeling where you know you’ve written it poorly, and you’ve already spent too much time on one question, and it seems so silly that these few hours are meant to be the condensed proof of months or years of university time.

Anyway, like a good girl, I’m now really hungover after indulging in a bottle of wine. My room’s a mess of notes and dirty dishes, and I never knew the prospect of pratting around tidying and watching TV could be so good. As for the rest of the day, my head’s still too foggy to plan, but I may take back a load of library books- at least they’re not supersize science textbooks- take out some books to read- I’m still a book nerd- and investigate Hyde Park for a good patch of grass to lie on.  Or go do some painting.

Head hurts, though. Red wine hangover bad.

I also note Imperial have posted a warning about the current situation on swine flu upon their homepage. This may be the only uneasy blip on the horizon of summery happiness…

Have had no home internet for the past 5 days, and unlikely to get any for another few. Studying at home… curtains drawn to block out the sunshine. When I’m inside, all I think about is getting outside. When outside, all I think about is whether I’ve memorised my revision or not. It’s like Apocalypse Now, except we don’t have a ceiling fan. Just a quick post before I head back home to do more… next Tuesday post-exams (5pm) seems like a distant, golden dream… seem to spend a lot of time reading and re-writing notes, only to find that the next day I have only a general, fuzzy comprehension of the topic instead of a nice list of remembered information. Oh, fortune. Oh, age. Oh, too many sodding exams throughout our lives.

I really should be studying. I have 2 modules I’m still very shaky on, and it’s only 10:30. My brain tends to go into simple mode at midnight, but that leaves an hour and a half of prospective study time. But I’m not studying… the prospect seems so… *boring*. I can’t think of one topic I would be even vaguely interested in reading about right now.

Maybe I’ve cracked, finally- hell, it hasn’t been a productive day at all. I watched documentaries and made up a long list of acronyms about documentaries to help me remember stuff via word association- memorisation without understanding, basically- but that took only until 2pm. Then I went to the bank, did a little grocery shopping, found Ethos closed, and came home. I’m not sure what happened in the intervening space between then and now. I recall spreading my notes out prettily over the desk, only to discover it was time to watch The Hospital.

Instead, I’ve been reading trash and weird science news. For example, it appears that trees can actually grow inside lungs, at least, in Russia. If it’s true, then that’s weirdly fascinating, but I’m pretty skeptical… it’ll just be like this behemoth snake photograph, which got me wildly saucer-eyed and excited in a naturalist / zoologist sort of vein, before I read further and realised it was just some joker poking fun at us all. The fir tree story also reminds me of another unusual news story, reporting a woman had accidentally inhaled a condom into her lung. Such stories give plenty of staring off quizzically into space time, for those of us with graphically visual imaginations.

Then there’s this guy. He’s an artist, and he’s had an ear surgically implanted in his arm.

'Mmm-hmm.'

Now, a basic approach to film analysis requires you to look at something called the mise-en-scene. Literally, this means everything that is in a shot, but also everything about how the shot has been structured- where the camera is, how the actors have been placed, what’s in the background, the foreground… To understand the meaning of the film, you interpret the mise-en-scene upon a denotative level, and a connotative level. The denotative level is the literal interpretation- say, Daisy’s standing behind some banisters. The connotative level is the metaphorical meaning, the associative meaning, the hidden layers. Say, the bannisters look like bars, Daisy’s trapped, imprisoned, a jailbird, a caged animal, etc.

So, I was thinking about what this man has done on both the literal way, and the secondarily meaningful way. The field of science-art interests me immensely, but I think I need some more schooling in art theory because I tend to bluntly reject a lot of modern art on the grounds of it being ugly / pretentious / pointless. This is not very artsy of me. Now, on the connotative level, he’s augmented his body in an unnatural but profoundly unusual way. The ear actually had a microphone, originally, but that had to be removed due to infection. The audience, us, could have heard the artist’s life through his art, through his very being- his body. He’s indicating the advancements of modern science. He’s using his own body as a display medium. It’s certainly provocative, whether your initial reaction is disgust or curiosity, or amusement- it catches the attention, and makes you ponder the ramifications of this.

On the denotative level, there’s a man who found a surgeon to put a cartilage ear grown from his own tissue, into his arm. It’s the shape of a human ear, in his arm. The man’s put an EAR in HIS ARM as an artwork. And I can’t help wondering about the ear’s affects on his spouse or significant other. Does he have to be careful about hugging them now, due to the ‘WHOA nearly touched me with that thing there…’ reaction as the ear almost makes contact with another’s exposed flesh? Are short sleeves in or out? Will he have problems hailing cabs? What’s going to go on the other arm? Should it have piercings? Is he going to start off a trend?

I’m finding such whimsical thoughts incredibly more entertaining than the six modes of documentary or the semiotics of radio, right now. This, is, a problem.

Here are some good looking shots of Battersea bridge as the sun went down. I cycled over the bridge, admiring the sights but still preferring to go home. Then I had to turn my bike around and go back to take photos.

And as for the title of the post, I keep thinking about what I want to do when revision ends. Ohhhh dear less than 2 weeks left and at least two modules I’m extremely shaky on. Today went for a little walk-around with company, gave some food for thought.

1. Seriously apply myself to producing some regular artwork. I tend to feel frustrated at my lack of inspiration, and so don’t do anything. Making art as gifts for people is also nice, but not really popular. I have a couple of ideas.

2. Make a series of ‘nature’ paintings to go with the leopard painting. Yes, animal portraits are generic, but they’re relatively interesting in their complexity. I can apply a bit of auteurship, perspective / colours / scenario. I figure if I don’t have ideas, I should just shut up and do something I know I can.

3. Up the informative content of this blog. Imperial news, science news, world news. I don’t want this to just turn into my haphazard diary.

More to come as and when the procrastination demon strikes. Time to get back to my tortured revision essays.

After getting stuck into a little rut where I sat about for two days, papers about me, but not really taking much in, on Saturday I and the beau go to see Fast & Furious at the cinema. I badly needed a bit of entertainment to reset my brain. With my conscience pestering me to get back to my chair-prison and the blanket of papers over my work table, we went along.

Now, I enjoyed the first FF film, mainly because it was dumb, had pretty men in it, fast cars, lots of flash, and a regularly featured hip-hop / rock soundtrack. I didn’t see the other films in the franchise, because the trailers looked too similar and had too much female booty-waving in them. The filmmakers having evidently exhausted themselves in terms of plot on the first film and needed to take a break for the rest of the films. This latest feature had the original cast in it, five years on.

With myself five years on since I saw the last one… probably… I pretty much enjoyed it. It was basically a cross between a hip-hop video, a men’s car magazine brought to life (often complete with scarcely hotpant-clad butts standing bountifully around whenever a car scene came on screen or a party was going on- where were the males at these parties??), car chases / races, and a pretty Paul Walker to look at during the unnecessary dialogue scenes. (”Are you the good guy pretending to be the bad guy… or the bad guy pretending to be the good guy,” hissed Love Interest at Confused Cop Paul Walker, who responds by blinking intently a few times before the scene ends. ‘Whoa,’ I thought. ‘You’re laying the deep and meaningful subtext to the film right out in the open there. Steady on.’).

Not that the plot made much sense about halfway through the film, though, but at that point you’re just waiting for the next car chase.

I thought I didn’t mind substituting plot, acting and script for flash, action and glamour.  Except for ‘Miami Vice’, which has to be one of the worst cop / action films I’ve ever seen and is still taking up valuable memory space two years on since I saw it. The boyfriend, unfortunately, spent much of the movie having pensive flashbacks about his own experiences with car crashes while I chortled obliviously away next to him.

Nonetheless, another affecting part of the evening wasn’t even part of the film, but the trailers that came before it.

There was a trailer for ‘X-men Origins: Wolverine’. While watching it, I actually yawned. It was a generic modern action trailer, a boring montage of flash. Odd that this should bother me when I was waiting to watch a film which was all flash- but this was a superhero film, a category of films I’m naturally quite a fan of. (Several fond and favourite films- Spiderman franchise, new Batman, X-Men. A couple of filth-stuck-on-the-heel-of-shoe films- Daredevil, Watchmen, third Matrix film).  This was the sort of film I should enjoy, but I wasn’t likely to, because the trailer made it look incredibly generic and dull. It was just as our film professor had commented- most films at mainstream cinemas are just Hollywood flash and glamour, forsaking intelligent narrative or believable plot for just the look of the film.

We get a trailer that starts with a few short bits of meaningful dialogue, sharp fade-outs to black, voiceovers, then an increasing intensity of action scenes. Wolverine slicing big metal things with his claws while screaming a lot, as he seems to like to do. Explosions. Glow-ey laser fire. As I twiddled with popcorn and yawned my way through the next trailer- escaped evil psychopath holds policeman’s family hostage, makes him get up to all kinds of demented stuff in the name of vengeance while cackling down a phoneline and probably doing naughty things with his offscreen hand- I wondered if studying cinema had damaged my ability to ooh and aah at pretty special effects on the silver screen. I’d definitely recommend studying cinema to gain masses more appreciation for the art that goes into a film… but then you do tend to be harder to impress thereafter, I think.

"Ships move, that's why they're called ships." AAARRRRGHH.

Incidentally, I forgot about Easter. I pretty much forgot about it the last two years, too, so to learn that the latest Friday was Good Friday was something of a shock to me. I am very annoyed that the university gym and library are operating under restricted hours. Also, I forgot to buy the beau an egg and am wondering if the shops will be open tomorrow, flogging eggs half-price. Whatever happens to the unsold eggs, anyway?

The cycle of revision naturally has its particular downsides. I’ve taken to studying a few days at Imperial, a few days at home. The home thing is good for now because I’ve tended to find myself spending a lot of time staring at my notes in a deep daydream at Imperial, or literally dropping off to sleep at the desk. After doing that the only solution is to wearily trudge the 5 flights of stairs down, then the two flights of stairs up to Humanities department, where I keep my horribly strong instant coffee.  Here at home, I can at least yawn as loudly as I want, or break off for impromptu bowls of horribly fibre filled cereal.

Yet there’s the extra feeling of loneliness when you’re studying at home, as you’re not surrounded by other students to give you a bit of company and motivation to keep going. And when things don’t seem to have been going well… you’re worried you’re not learning enough, you’ve had arguments, you haven’t had enough conversation with people lately, you’re wearing comfy but sloppy clothing and so feel haggard as well as ignored… I think the gloom of these factors is felt somewhat more.

Every student has spells of troubles, I’m sure, and I don’t really want to write a long pontificating post about experiences or the best way to deal with them. If anyone would think this is helpful, you only have to comment and ask further. Yes, I’ve had plenty of troubles before, and I wish my brain would stop throwing up flashbacks while I’m sitting here trying to revise and focus on the present. Still, I am feeling a bit down at the moment, and I can’t be the only one, judging by how packed the library is during the vacation. I do things like getting exercise and telling myself that stepping outside, even for an aimless wander, are helpful, but when the cloud sinks down, I don’t feel like I have the energy or will to do such things. I tell myself it would just be a waste of time, in the end- the cloud will pass in an hour.

So what’s my point, in this post? Well, this is student life. You spend so much time having to internalise lots of information, live in your head, and be pressured to think about the future when it’s quite unknowable, that these kinds of moods are not uncommon, at all.

Lolcats cheer Annabel up

Had an interview for a work placement yesterday. Finding my bike the best method for getting there, even with a 45-minute journey- it *was* sunny- I went along. I stopped off at Imperial to drop off a bag of wushu weapons for my beau’s wushu class later that evening, realising that it might look bad to step into the production company office with a bag of Chinese swords on my back. After a lot of manic pedalling and near-bussplat misses, I found the right street, then found the innocuous door, squeezed between tailor shops and small supermarkets. Stepping inside, I found myself in a quiet hall of thick carpet, and upstairs, a small collection of offices.

After a bit of handshaking, the two interviewers / director and series editor, started absently asking questions. I say absently, because the affair was very informal, and a bit odd.

‘Have you had any offers from other companies?’

I thought, [Hmm, honesty may be the best tack here... I have received a casual acceptance from another company who seem rather, well, busy, since I only receive one sentence emails from them with skimpy punctuation. Emails like 'Fine just tell us dates' and 'of course'. Against my own verbose and stuffily articulated emails and replies, this has the effect of making me sound like an Oxbridge toff.] Yes,’ I said brightly. ‘Very short replies from a company I think who are rather busy-’

‘Because we need to know that if we offer this placement, someone will take it…’

‘Oh, of course, no this would definitely be my first choice!’ Nervous laugh. I was being perky. I seem to be rather perky these days- making up for days of gloom in yesteryears, I suspect. I have plenty of perky-cheery karma to spend. ‘This has a great reputation in our department… and I find the subject interesting!’

They look a bit surprised that their place has a great reputation. ‘So… why do you want to make science documentaries? What are you hoping this placement will give… to you?’

Oh god, the ‘why are you here’ question. I wasn’t quite sure how to handle this one. Did they want me to quickly break down my background? My psychoanalysis of myself? To just express current and present enthusiasm? Saying ‘Because I just do, I think it’ll be interesting and that’s why I’m doing this course’ doesn’t sound convincing enough by itself. I always feel the need to back it up with a bit of past exposition. The problem is how to present it without giving a self-indulgent ten minute monologue about Yourself.

I wasn’t going to get any further help from the two interviewers, either, as the dead silence in the office when no one was speaking came rushing in full force. ‘Did a Biology degree… became interested in science communication… heard about the SMP course… sounded really interesting…’ I blathered variously along these lines, adding cheerily, ‘Haha, this is like my interview for my course last year…’ [Bugger, that sounded unprofessional. What did I say in my interview last year? I must have had some good turns of phrase for them to let me in. I can't remember! Just keep talking...]

Actually, in hindsight I think I kept raving about the artistic and creative nature of media editing at the interview. Never mind. At one point I even asked further what sort of thing they wanted to hear about- again, probably a bad move.

‘I’m interested in learning about topics, it sounds strange, but I’d like to be able to show other people how I see them, share the interest…’

‘So become a teacher,’ suggested one man. He was the main questioner and seemed a bit tired, judging by his general head rubbing and weary look. It was 4:30 and nearing the end of the working day.

‘Ah, but that’s just not creative enough…’ I said. Something along those lines. He nodded, as though to say ‘Aha!’

‘It sounds like you want a job in the media, not just a job in science media.’

[Which was the worse answer? If I say yes to the former, does that make me a shallow media-thrill seeker? If I say yes to the second, am I pigeonholing myself into a small specialty?] ‘Science media first… media second. I don’t want to pigeonhole myself, though ideally it would be science…’ I burbled something alone the lines of that. The two fellas gave the impression of having stopped listening halfway through.

‘What were the last science documentaries you watched?’

[Good question. I had watched plenty of snippets of this or that, but I couldn't remember what the last entire and surely 'science' documentaries were] ‘Haha, well to be perfectly honest, the last science documentaries I watched were two episodes of your show this morning,’ I said merrily.

‘Oh, I don’t know if they’re science. Othermanintheroom, would you say they’re science? No, they’re more like humanities…’

[I thought that's what you wanted me to say they were science, judging from the questions you were asking earlier...] ‘Well yes, in a sense, I know they’re not entirely scientific…’ [backpedal, backpedal, too late as I don't think they're listening]

‘Which ones?’

I tell. They nod and chat a little between themselves about people I don’t know.

‘What did you like about them?’

I talk more. I suspect I should not have mistaken ‘being honest’ for shooting myself in the foot when at one point, I admit that I don’t know a lot about the topic of the programmes, but generally enjoyed the programme appearance and felt curious enough to go and research the topic afterwards. In hindsight, I should have made more effort to show the programmes taught me something. Which means it would have helped to watch the shows properly, instead of keeping one eye on the programme and the other on my revision notes.

I also hastily interrupted the ongoing question to add another thing I liked about the programme. It took a bit of time to explain. ‘You mean, how it extrapolates,’ the man finally said, neatly shortening my wordy explanation down to a couple of words.

[That was the word!] ‘Yes!’

The talk moved onto the placement itself. ‘So you just want to make TV programmes.’

[Is this a trick question? Sounds a bit simple. I know, I'll basically reply yes but with enough talk to make myself sound more thoughtful about the issue... and not like a talky perky scatty person at all. Sigh. Exactly like one]

‘You’ll see. It’ll be extremely boring. It’s all fun for the first few hours, then everybody but those two at the front will be sitting around twiddling their thumbs.’

I laugh and smile, beaming inane enthusiasm.

‘No, it’s really like that.’

Annabel shrugs and says, ‘Oh, well…’ in a ruefully merry way. She wonders how long perkiness, cheer or enthusiasm will actually last on these placements. Probably to the end of the third day, when the greyness and reality of the media workplace will swamp her like an upended concrete truck. Meanwhile, she beams about it like a lamb butting its head against the slaughterhouse gates.

They ask a few things about my summer work (making a documentary), a few things about the department. I’m embarrassingly unable to answer what type of cameras we use. Is he asking about the make and model? The mm of film? I get a mindblank, embarrassment, self-deprecating admit so.

‘Right, well, okay…. any… questions?’

I ask about the dates. This turns out to be a good question, as the two men then notice their May project is a tricky one, where the work experience / general assistant won’t be able to go along, so the bonus of on-site shooting is briefly blotted out. There is a confusing discussion between them. They ask more questions about dates at me. Eventually, the situation is resolved. A couple of other questions… then it’s time for a friend and co-student’s interview. I bob about saying thanks and pleasantries, shake a hand, and go.

As for the aftermath, I don’t think I presented myself in the best way. Probably the best thing to do in an interview (I’m guessing) is to mirror the interviewer’s demeanour, but with more pleasantries. I suspect I appeared a bit too ‘chatty’ and cheery. It probably would have helped to have said less and with more seriousness about what I liked about their programmes. I won’t be too bitter if I don’t nab it, as I like my competitors well enough not to be envious. Still… I can’t help feeling sobered by what seems to have been another strong hint at the duller realities of this career again.

Anyway, a week of time will tell, and in the meantime I have to put it out of my mind while I study. Today’s topic- sociology and science, or, a lot of sociologists theorising about why they can theorise about science. I don’t think I’m as thoughtful and well balanced as I like to believe. The scientist in me shouts that their theories are all well and interesting, but at the end of the day it’s the scientists who go back to the labs and actually try and *do* something, discover something, build something, instead of writing archaic papers for other sociologists to argue between themselves till death. I must be a closet positivist- a ’science is the only true knowledge’ elitist. I’d better not tell anybody.

Umm, counting the days didn’t last long, perhaps because I am a little afraid of the consequences of having to look at a calendar and see how many days of study have already passed me by. x days and n amount of study done = Annabel has a panic in her own, special way.

So far it’s become very apparent that the amount of work that actually gets done just never lives up to my estimates… too often, I can end up finding only one page of written notes, several sketched mindmapp-y diagrams, and the rest of my reading floating around in my head, somewhere. I tell myself this is a consequence of studying film form and the history of cinema, which was last week’s topics- I end up doing more reading than writing.

Something about the nature of the topics.

Man, I’m so articulate…

What else have I been up to of late… err… well, I’ve largely given up studying at home, except for on the weekends when during my breaks I can usually have a massive cup of tea and watch my boyfriend smashing aliens to slimy pieces on his Xbox, (There’s something comforting in the mindlessness after the trying trials of trying to absorb the cleverness of strangers through the written words of their textbooks). Oh, the blissful freetime of the gainfully employed! But studying at home only works for short periods before I get irritated with spending too much time in a tiny room by myself, or find more laundry to be cursed about and done. So now I go lurk in the library each day, or in the Humanities department where the hot water is free and my cheap coffee is crap.

‘You seem to be the other face who’s always here,’ a nameless fellow from another course commented cheerfully in passing. ‘Yes,” I agreed, and… didn’t have anything else to add, because that was my tedious current life in a nutshell.

Around 6pm I usually crack and go to Ethos (specifically made for Imperial, but full of the usual gym stereotypes- unsmiling, bored reception staff, refusal to allow anyone in unless they’re students of some kind, even if they’re external members of IC clubs…) to use their gym. I’ve not been able to start my free-weights workout, like I was ranting about earlier in my blog, mainly because a) the free weights area is very popular and crowded b) the weights look big and my arms are twigs and c) due to b) and myself being a little bashful / cowardly / pathetic sometimes, I’m weaning myself on the easier machines. So far, after a few 2 hours sessions, I’ve managed to sweat an amazing amount of liquid through my face alone, work my arms, and damage my butt. Like many women, I am drawn to the weight machines with helpful diagrams with the butt / thigh muscles meaningfully highlighted, in the hope of creating buns of steel and Xena-like warrior woman thighs. This is why I now can’t run or jump without weird butt cheek pain, as I discovered in another hopelessly unacrobatic wushu session. Incidentally, if anyone should accost me on campus, please refrain from commenting on the aforementioned parts, I’m not looking for second opinions, constructive criticism, or compliments. On the plus side, I think I spotted a bicep on my arm, the other day.

The staff newspaper, Reporter, recently did a feature on the bloggers, especially Jaimie and myself, and the blogs were also featured on the main Imperial page. I don’t think it’s led to anyone recognising me… sometimes i think a few people stare as I enter the library to join the ranks of the quietly accepting doomed, but, that may be because I’m usually laden with bags and glowering because I’m laden with bags and have a penchant for 2 hour lunchbreaks and studying on the top floor. I suspect the undergrads have better material to blog about…

Eek. Suddenly i’m glad that guilt compelled me to stay in and read about Soviet Formalism, instead of going out with a camera for my wannabe journalist urges. So much for peaceful protests… the trashing of a bank is not going to lend much credence to the protestors as a whole. Bad actions and violence from a few will tar them as a wild and wilful mob, not a legal march of protest.

Another thing I like about living in London is hearing well known place names, or stumbling across them on travels. I could visit Brick Lane, not just read the novel, go to almost all the spaces on the Monopoly board, spy on the Prime Minister’s house. In theory. With that in mind, I feel there are always good opportunities for student journalism- to go out and witness news happening in the form of marches or congregations, free lectures, random happenings, random features about places.

Revision sputtering into life, maybe. Am writing essays as a method of revision, instead of reading too many obscure pages from essays… still… horribly slow and painful process. Everytime I glance out the window, I see the sunlight and my skin cries out pitifully for vitamin D, for golden warmth, for the free open breeze… Managed to go jogging yesterday, more stumbling, really. I was full of boredom-coffee and boredom-snacking. Was very disappointed to find the Apprentice was supposed to be on tonight, not yesterday. At least I have an incentive to work hard today, though!